Resident Evil: Aftermath
by Kryptale
Summary: Set two months after the events of RESIDENT EVIL: DEGENERATION, Leon Kennedy and Claire Redfield reunite once more when they become the first target of their deadliest of enemies. Based in part on the novel series by S.D. Perry.


**Resident Evil Aftermath  
Chapter One - Culmination  
**(Please read and review, it makes us better writers.)

_Disclaimer: I do not own Resident Evil and no profit was gained  
from the writing of this story. Based on the novels by S.D. Perry and game by Capcom._

Jackson groaned, running one of his boney hands through his overly greasy hair.

Dawn had most certainly set in on the outside, and here he was, trapped within an underground facility made almost entirely of steel. Reflective steel floors, reflective steel walls...it was something that the former Umbrella Corporation board member had become all too accustomed to during his long life, and something he had honestly hoped to never see again.

_It's the little things in life that take us back..._

Sighing a bit more heavily, Jackson took another glance around the room. Some of the people seated at the not-so-elegant meeting setup were also people he had expected to never see again. Most of them had gone into hiding more than a year earlier, all of them fugitives from most of the world's governments.

With the exception of three chairs in the room, all of them were filled. Having been the first one to arrive in the room, Jackson had taken the time to glance at the embedded gold-plate name tags accompanying the table space directly in front of each chair.

Frank Sidney, still looking quite youthful, occupied the seat directly across from Jackson. Next to him was Richard Duvall, who was engaged in a hushed conversation with Thomas Erickson.

The three empty seats belonged to three others, all of them formerly high-ranking within White Umbrella's inner-circle. One of them belonged to Jay Reston,an up-and-coming scientist that had done many great things. Jackson hadn't heard from him since the incident in Utah, and the majority of the board believed him to have died in the explosion. Still, whomever had called the meeting wasn't quite aware.

The first of the two remaining unoccupied chairs was labeled for Ozwell Spencer himself. The host of this junctier certainly couldn't actually be expecting the old man to actually show, and it seemed to Jackson that it was most likely probably just a formality.

_But Trent..._

The final of the unoccupied chairs belonged to Trent. Trent had practically run White Umbrella for a very long time, taking the seat alongside Spencer who had been very hands-off from anything that wasn't legitimate Umbrella business. Some said that the old man was tired of watching the experiments fail, but others believed that Trent kept him on a chain, and that he was the true defacto head of White Umbrella.

Jackson wasn't sure if Trent would show. The man was mysterious, and practically impossible to predict in terms of actions. He was one of the few people that actually frightened Jackson, and if his former leader did make an appearance, this night would be a bit uncomfortable for everyone present.

"They contact you the same as us?"

Erickson's inquiry startled Jackson out his his thought process, but he did his best not to let it show. He regarded the older man with pity. Thomas Erickson hadn't met well with time. His hair was almost compleyely gone, the last remainders of it gray and ragged. Even his suit looked thrown together, hanging off of a frame that looked as if the once wealthy executive hadn't enjoyed a decent meal since Umbrella's collapse.

Jackson had received invitation to this meeting only two days earlier. With it had arrived a plane ticket and instructions on reaching the facility, along with a casette tape that when played, produced the voice of someone that obviously didn't want to be recognized. It was digitally modified.

"It doesn't matter," Jackson told his former colleague. "What matters is that we're here, and we need to hope that we didn't walk into a government trap."

Erickson shook his head in a sporadic way that only an old man could. "No," he said, his voice dry. "Not possible. This would be entrapment, and we're out of most governmental jurisdiction. I don't think we're looking at a meeting with any government."

The old man was right, of course. No government that was looking for them could even legally touch them in South America. They surely wouldn't take a risk at rounding them all up and then getting the case thrown out due to unlawful conduct.

_Then again, since when has any government been _smart_?_

He need to focus and stop thinking. He was just making himself more nervous the more he put thought into the entire situation. It could be a government trap, it could be a simple meeting between former colleages, or it could even be a hostile meeting with the renegade former S.T.A.R.S. members that had caused Umbrella so much trouble in the past. Regardless, he and the rest of the team were present, and there wasn't much at all they could do to changet the situation.

Jackson was startled out of his own thoughts once again as he jerked his neck around to see a large, wall-sized monitor flicker to life. The former Umbrella executive could have sworn that it was just another glass wall when he had come into the room.

On the screen was Umbrella's logo, spinning, occasionally splitting apart and reforming in the same pattern. It was too familiar.

"Welcome former Umbrella Corporation employees," said a cool, computerized voice. "We hope that you are enjoying your stay here at Tri-Cell. As you may realize, our business interests are entirely the same, which is why we here at Tri-Cell have asked for time out of your busy lives to make you an offer."

Jackson stared at the screen in disbelief. Had this entire thing been a simple facade to get the most brilliant minds behind Umbrella Corporation's success into a single room to be preached to by Tri-Cell?

Tri-Cell had been one of the leading companies in medical research, standing just behind Umbrella in terms of success and and profit for decades. They had essentially replaced Umbrella as the world's leading pharmaceutical company, and now they had the nerve to bring these brilliant men into the same room in order to be gloated upon?

"Here at Tri-Cell, we strive to be the best at everything in which we embark. We offer the greatest employee salaries and benefits in the world, and employ only the greatest minds of our time to help forge a brighter future for humanity."

_What is this, a fucking recruitment video!? Motherfucker..._

Jackson could feel the unease in the room; could practically cut the tension between his former his former colleages and their unseen hosts with a knife. They all felt insulted by this, tricked! It was nearly as bad as being dragged out of hiding by the government.

"Enough with this shit," Sidney proclaimed in his booming voice, quite masculine voice. "I wanna see the assholes that brought us out here, not some video explaining motherfucking Tri-Cell!"

Almost as if waiting for a cue, the monitor shut off, blending back into the sleek steel played walls. The men all sat, the chatter in the air making it difficult to believe that there were only four people in the room.

With a loud ruckus, the steel door that all of the men had entered through opened. Hell, no one had even noticed it close! A tall man stepped into the room, his hair suavely kept, but his features sagging as if he hadn't slept for days. He was well dressed, wearing a black suit that contrasted heavily against his pale skin.

_Trent_.

It was definitely him, there was no mistaking it, and the man looked as if he hadn't aged a day since Jackson had last seen him. Even the look of perpetual exhaustion was well a commonly displayed feature of Trent's. Despite his lacking appearance, Trent had always had an air of disturbing power about him, a sense that the man was _always _in control of the situation.

"Gentlemen," Trent said, smiling with energy that it didn't seem like he should have. "I'm glad you could all make it. As you can imagine, it took quite a bit of time and quite a bit of effort to track you all down. As my former colleagues at the Umbrella Corporation, I couldn't allow you to miss out on this event!"

Jackson understood the big picture as soon as Trent had opened his mouth to speak. Obviously he had taken up a position within Tri-Cell after the fall of Umbrella. Honestly, this changed things for Jackson. If Trent was in any sort of high ranking position within Tri-Cell, it might not be such a bad thing to come on board with the company.

"I'm sorry about the video," Trent said, taking his seat. "That was a mistake. You see, I have no intention of bringing you on board at Tri-Cell. I apologize if I brought any inflation to your hopes for the future, mild or otherwise."

Jackson squirmed a bit. It wasn't disappointing, but suddenly he didn't feel safe. What the hell was this guy playing at?

"I brought you here simply to thank you for your years of hard work," Trent said. "I regret that Spencer couldn't be here to receive my thanks, but I know where he's hiding. I'll make sure he's properly accredited for his actions soon enough."

"You brought us here to thank us?" Sidney asked, considerably more calm than he had been before. Sidney had an infamous temper, but he'd never once lost it when addressing Trent.

"Certainly," Trent said. "Thanks to our aquisition and subsequent liquidation of WilPharma, along with some strenuous hours put in by a colleague of mine, Tri-Cell now holds ownership over Umbrella's viral research. If it hadn't been for the White Umbrella staff, none of this would have been possible."

"W-what do you mean?" Duvall stammered harshly over his words.

"It was White Umbrella who peddled the viruses on the black market, yes?" Trent asked, obviously already knowing the answer. "Because of that, WilPharma was able to get support from the government for a vaccine, putting the viruses in their hands. All of this was because of you. And now I'd like you to meet my esteemed colleage. Without him, I couldn't have so well formulated this plan."

Jackson turned his eyes to the open door. Footsteps could be heard coming down the hall. Jackson was even less prepared for what came through the door than he had been when it was Trent.

A man even taller than Trent walked in, donned in black clothing. His skin was pale, offset by the reflective black shades that the man wore, as well as the well groomed blonde hair.

_Wesker!_

Albert Wesker had been one of Umbrella's top researchers, rivaled only by William Birkin in terms of genius. The man had always been mysterious and secretive, and somehow an alliance between he and Trent seemed almost a no-brainer.

"Albert here has been working hard to recover virus samples from around the world," Trent proclaimed proudly. "And he also happens to be the man who shut Umbrella down by handing the Red Queen files over to the United States government."

Everyone in the room turned their shocked gazes to Wesker. The gazes all quickly transformed into glares of anger, distrust and pain.

"Why destroy Umbrella, Trent?" Jackson snapped suddenly. "What could you have possibly gained? You were at the top, practically the head of the company. What could TriCell possibly do for you that Umbrella couldn't? And just how the hell have you managed to keep away from the government!?"

Trent only smiled confidently. "I gained everything from Umbrella's collapse," he said a bit more agrily than he looked. "This board ordered the deaths of my parents almost twenty years ago, and it's funny. As intelligent and bright as Umbrella claims to be, no one ever caught on. Trent? A facade, a mask. Trent doesn't exist, and so the Umbrella executive by that name will forever remain at the top of most wanted lists across the world.

"My father was the creator of the T-Virus, a genius, brighter than any of you, than Birkin, than Wesker. And you all had him killed so that Spencer could line his pockets with more money. It's funny that--despite my apparent lack of a last name, or any sort of background at all--not a question was raised. It goes to show you just how easy it is to infiltrate the great Umbrella Corporation."

"Your father was Marcus?" Sidney asked, obviously without thinking.

_"JAMES TRENTON MARCUS!"_ Trent's voice boomed. "My full name is Victor James Marcus. You slaughtered my father for no good reason. It was always about the money, never about the research. Too much corruption, not enough love for the art. You were always fools."

Jackson could tell that everyone in the room was stunned, but Jackson was even more so. It was very apparent that Trent hadn''t figured something out, and as far as Jackson could remember, he was the only one in the room who was ware of the identity of the men who had killed James Marcus.

With a glance at Wesker, Jackson became suddenly aware that the man was holding a silenced pistol. None of them were getting out of this alive. It seemed almost pointless to tell Trent the truth. There was only one armed man in the room, and he was the worst possible person to be wielding a weapon at this moment.

Wesker raised the weapon and fired, and suddenly Sidney was dead. Just like that, it was over for one of the previous untouchable White Umbrella members. Rickson was clutching his chest in pain, as if he were having a heart attack, and Wesker ended it quickly by firing once more.

_He'll leave me alive last. I'm the closest to Trent. He'll want to badger me to the end to enjoy it..._

"Trent, Spencer ordered your father dead," Jackson said calmly. "But I chose the assassins, and now one of the men that killed your father is the only man in this room that has a gun."

Trent's eyes seemed to bulge out of his skull. As Jackson had guessed, the man hadn't known. For the first time since Jackson had met the cool, unpredictable man, Trent was out of control and had been trumpeted as a schemer.

"That's right," came the accented voice of Albert Wesker. Out of nowhere, the heavy door to the room slammed shut and sealed. "I killed Doctor Marcus so that Birkin and myself could take over his research. Suddenly, there were only two co-founders for Umbrella, and I was on the verge of power. What did I have to lose?"

"You _son of a bitch!_" Trent scream in rage. It seemed as if he would charge across the room at Wesker, but another silent shot from Wesker's pistol kept Trent seated, putting a wound in the aging man's upper chest.

"I'm sorry Trent, but there's just no room for two under _my _Umbrella."

"You planned all of this you motherf--"

A shot straight through the eye cut off Trent's sentence, and he was dead. Jackson couldn't believe it, but shook it off quickly. He was trapped in a room with Duvall, neither of them capable of taking on Wesker, but they had to try.

Jackson nodded to Duvall, and they were both on their feet, charging on their shaded assassin. Wesker fired a shot, which hit Duvall, but gave Jackson enough time to grab hold of Wesker's pistol and push his arm away.

But then something was wrong. Jackson felt a slight jerk, and then Wesker wasn't there anymore. The hair on the back of the former executive's neck stood on end, and he knew that someone was behind him.

Duvall, neither of them capable of taking on Wesker, but they had to try.

Jackson nodded to Duvall, and they were both on their feet, charging on their shaded assassin. Wesker fired a shot, which hit Duvall, but gave Jackson enough time to grab hold of Wesker's pistol and push his arm away.

But then something was wrong. Jackson felt a slight jerk, and then Wesker wasn't there anymore. The hair on the back of the former executive's neck stood on end, and he knew that someone was behind him.

_Couldn't be Wesker, that's not pos--_

And Jackson Cortlandt thought no more.


End file.
